The SP808 series does not have an onboard sequencer -- not really, anyway. The manual, I think calls it an AUTO STEP SEQUENCER.

Basically what you do is, you sellect the AUTO funtion on your SONG's TIMELINE [on the DIGITAL FOUR TRACK SECTION,] and when you get your cursor to the measure you want a phrase sample to trigger, you can press your sample-pad and it will remember to AUTOMATICALLY trigger off that sample [remeber to select AUTO -- otherwise it will physically stamp the data onto the selected track, eating up valuable storage space]. Something like that; it's been a while since I owned my SP808.

You can also TRIGGER off pads with an external seqencer -- cool if you're ONLY into using PHRASE SAMPLES and are not trying to make your own drum kits on each individual pad. Which brings me to my next issue with the SP808, if you're planning on making the SP808 your main MUSIC WORKSTATION it only has FOUR notes of polyphony -- meaning you can only have four pads working at one time. Not ideal for making DRUM kits, also not very good for sending rapid fire MIDI triggers like Drum'n'Bass.

But it is a pretty awesome machine if you're going to be doing a lot of REMIXING. It did a few on the SP808 from master DAT tapes, and it worked like a charm. I double up most of my tracks after I had a chance to add effects and re-process and resample the original sounds. Then, I would consecutively place each sample back-to-back on the TIME LINE using that AUTO STEP SEQUENECER thingie I mentioned earlier, and it worked really well.

Still, If you're looking for a HARDCORE sampler with an awesome sequencer, that will work for both your home studio and live DJ sets, the AKAI MPC's are the best.

Also look for the RS7000, which comes out late April, early May 2001. It will very a worth contender to the AKAI MPC's.

Late,